The Guardian - Sat 13 August 2005 - Category: Environment
Headed: "Are clothes collectors breaking the rules?
A company run by Lithuanians has been the subject of complaints but still operates despite growing official concern. Rupert Jones reports"

The Guardian - Saturday 18 August 2007 - Category: Money
Headed: "The great charity collection scam
It's a particularly unpleasant crime: posing as a good cause, taking advantage of people's better nature and stealing £3m a year from the genuine charities. Tony Levene looks at the gangs who are behind the clothing collection rip-off"

"Charity cheats laid bare - by you
Outraged readers were quick to get in touch after we exposed
bogus collectors who sell donated clothing. Tony Levene reports

Guardian Money readers have written to us in their thousands after our
exposure last week of the murky world of bogus collectors who deprive
legitimate charities of millions of pounds a year.
Readers also sent us flyers from the bogus firms. One of the more
outrageous ones came from Support and Help, which asks people to
"spare any of your unwanted clothes which will be sent to the Third World
where the garments will be carefully sorted and worn again". This . . . "

There follows information on :

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA)

The National Blind Children's Society (NBCS)

I & G Cohen (clothing collector for NBCS).

Below this, there are 10 letters and emails from readers commenting on the issues.

The Guardian - Tues 26 May 2009
Category: Money > Charitable giving > Money blog - by Hilary Osborne
Headed: "Is it OK to take things from outside a charity shop?
A reader ponders the ethics of taking charity donations that have been left outside"

"Not your average charity shop
Retail expert Mary Portas is leading a charity shop revolution: she
wants to make them better for shoppers and for the charities that
run them. Simon Chilvers meets her - and gets a makeover from
designer Fee Doran in an Oxfam shop . . . "

"The tills are ringing in the charity shops ... for now
Shoppers are pouring through the doors in the hunt for festive
bargains, but the supply of clothes and bric-a-brac is about to dry
up, writes Peter Davy

. . . As a rule of thumb, volunteer-run website
Charitybags.org.uk reckons that goods in charity shops sell at 15 per cent
of their original price. . . .

However, the real danger is a shortage of donations . . .

. . . people are misled into thinking the private [clothing] collectors
are charitable - a tendency encouraged by vague references, such as
'helping families in need', in some leaflets used to publicise companies'
collections. . . . "

Intersecond Ltd / Azzara & Do Not Delay (breast cancer project in Lithuania)
The article includes a fascinating sequence of letters between Andrew Penman and Raimondas Biguzas (Director of Intersecond Ltd)

"Donating an unwanted Xmas jumper to charity? It could end up here"
- on an industrial estate at Rainham, Essex

"Charity 'Fagan' used children to steal donated clothes:
Slovakian dad-of-six [name], was caught sending his kids out to steal
bags [of clothing] left for the Yorkshire Cancer Centre."

This is a well-written collection of concise, engaging articles, with useful photographs of leaflets etc. A mine of information.
Also there are hundreds of comments from members of the public in the forums attached.

Quote from the website :

"Andrew Penman and Nick Sommerlad form the Daily Mirror's Investigations team. They write a weekly column in the Mirror every Thursday and they're here to help uncover the scams, and expose the people behind them. They won the Cudlipp Award for campaigning popular journalism at the 2010 British Press Awards."

A big issue for charities is whether to use face-to-face or street
fundraising, sometimes called (by people who don't like this method)
charity mugging or 'chugging'. This is where a team of people stand on
the street and sign passers-by up to give money to charity by
direct debit. . . . "